Transformers

Ramblings of an insane man *Titans Return rant*

Transformers: Titans Return. Where do I even begin with this show? Ladies and gentlebots, once again Machinima has provided us with a new “mature” Transformers cartoon and that is Transformers: Titans Return, the sequel to Combiner Wars. Combiner Wars received mixed and negative reviews. Machinima said things would improve, but have they? Have they? My thoughts on the entirety of Transformers: Titans Return can be summed up in one meme:

I went into Titans Return with absolutely no expectations for it, and I was still disappointed. So I have a numerous amount of problems with this show, why don’t I talk about them?

The animation

First of all, the animation. It’s not the worst animation in a Transformers show, but it’s far, far from perfect. The characters have absolutely no weight to them. These are giant alien robots on a planet the size of Saturn. They should feel heavy, yet they feel so light. The Titans and Combiners seem to move with swiftness that I don’t think should be possible. Heck, Megatron picks up Devastator by the leg at one point. Not only that, but the characters move very slowly, and because of that they feel very off. How can you make characters feel light, but they move slowly? It’s distracting and unsatisfactory.

The facial expressions and the body language looks extremely janky, and the animation doesn’t have a lot of frames per second. In one scene, we have Overlord dancing around like a f**king madman. None of the characters have any interesting body language or make any interesting faces. It just feels off. Oh, and the lip syncing sucks.

Not only that, but where the hell is everybody? I know Cybertron is a dead world, but there are cities there with no one living in them. No one’s running or screaming, nothing. It just make the world seem empty and lifeless. Where the hell did the animation budget go?? They couldn’t even bother to animate some generics or add some sound affects or anything.

Plot and Characters

This story seems to drag on for way too long. It feels like it takes forever for s**t to happen. It takes them way too long to take Trypticon down. The story is very boring and not engaging in the slightest. I don’t know how they could possibly make a story about a mechanical Godzilla destroying everything boring, but they found a way too. I’m never left wondering what will happen next, I’m never on the edge of my seat. I’m just so bored.

The characters are also very boring. If you ever though that Optimus Prime was a boring character, then boy are you not gonna like him in this show. He’s almost as bad, if not worse than Optimus in TFP.

Rodimus seems to lack that turbo revvin spirit, and that’s partly because of the vocal talent. More on that later.

Windblade is just there. At the start it seems like she may go through some interesting development, but she doesn’t. She remains the same throughout the entire narrative.

The Combiners barely do anything in this show. Devastator and Menasor are mentally unstable war machines, why aren’t they destroying anything? If they are mentally unstable war machines, then why would the Autobots allow them to remain combined? Why are the characters always combined in the first place?

Overlord is a problem in of himself. The first time we’ve seen him in Transformers media since Mtmte and he does not do an absolute goddamn thing aside from kill the Mistress of Flame and turn Rodimus into Rodimus Unicronus, but because that’s all we see him do, and because Trypticon is a bigger problem, I just don’t care about him. There is no reason as to why he shows up. He’s literally just there. Hell after he kills he Mistress and corrupts Rodimus, he does nothing for the rest of the cartoon. He isn’t the same twisted individual we knew in Mtmte. He was a complete waste of a character.

Voice Performances and Sound Design.

Now I don’t hate any of the people who provided their vocal talents for this show, but the vocal performances leave much to be desired. Peter Cullen and Judd Nelson are back to voice Optimus and Rodimus respectively, and that’s great, but their performance is dry and they don’t say anything memorable.

Now I don’t have a problem with celebrity voices, but I don’t like Charlie Guzman (DashieGames) or Matthew Patrick (MatPat) as Menasor and Computron respectively. Menasor sounds like a school yard bully, and I just don’t really like MatPat as Computron. It just isn’t my cup of tea.

To me the worst vocal performance is Overlord, Overlord is probably the worst thing about this show. Overlord has a western accent for whatever reason. Did they ever ask James Roberts or Nick Roche, the guys who have written Overlord in English what accent he has or what he sounds like?

Now, not all of the vocal performances in this show suck. Megatron and Perceptor are fine. They don’t leave an impression, but they’re fine. I like that they got Mark Hamill to voice Megatronus Prime, but other than that I don’t like much else.

The sound design in this show sucks too. Sometimes I can barely hear the characters over what’s happening. Not only that, but the transformation noise sounds off and unsatisfactory.

Conclusion

What pains me the most is that this is supposed to be a Transformers show that is for mature audiences. That means they can get darker, they can get grittier, they can get deeper, just like in the Dreamwave and IDW comics. They had a chance to make a deep and compelling Transformers cartoon yet they didn’t. It honestly baffles me how some people on think RiD is worse than this. RiD sure ain’t perfect but this cartoon makes RiD look like Beast Wars.

Hasbro, wake me when you make a mature Transformers cartoon similar to Voltron: Legendary Defender and you put it on Netflix. Until then, I give this series a 4/10. The only reason I would watch Power of the Primes is because Optimus Primal is being voiced by Ron Perlman.

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Yeah, I agree with all your points basically. The only reason I was able to sit through it without falling asleep was because I was watching it with my sister, and we always try to outdo each other with funny comments about whatever really bad or really good show we're watching.

And my favorite bullslag moment was when Optimus literally jumped over Trypticon, clearing his head by a good amount, and landing a bit away, without looking like severe effort was taken with that action.